


Canary

by the_alchemist



Category: Hadestown - Mitchell
Genre: BDSM, F/M, Master/Pet, Post-Canon, Power Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:55:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21884848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_alchemist/pseuds/the_alchemist
Summary: Hades owns everything in this world; Euridice has nothing left, or so she believes. But Hades is a deal-maker, so he must show her otherwise. Will she remain his pet, a canary in a cage, or what other roles can she buy with the willing submission of her body, her sex and her mind?
Relationships: Eurydice/Hades (Hadestown)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	Canary

**Author's Note:**

  * For [The_Midnight_Girl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Midnight_Girl/gifts).



> Huge thanks to my lovely beta reader S.

The girl lay curled in the middle of the bird cage. She felt the cold bite of the bare metal bars against her bare skin, but not the discomfort of it. The cold, and the red stripes across her body were merely facts, not the cause of any emotion. She registered the beauty of the silver dome above her head, but felt no pleasure. And what she felt in her belly was probably not hunger, but merely the memory of hunger. The dead do not need to eat.

Now and again, he came to look at her, his dark eyes roving across from her hair, to her breasts, to her cunt, to her feet. He did not speak, and neither did she.

She did not feel boredom. Time was a hazier concept down here.

She did not miss her lover, but sometimes she wished she did.

'Are you angry with me?'

A flicker of something – surprise? – at the sound of his deep, slow voice.

'No.'

'Then what _do_ you feel, little canary?'

There was no point in lying. 'I feel hungry.'

'If I give you food, what will you give me in return?'

'You already have everything of me and mine. There is nothing left to give you.' She recounted this as mere fact.

'If I give you food,' he said, 'will you kneel at my feet?'

She pondered this for a moment. 'How much food?' she asked. 'And what kind?'

His smile was that of one who understood and approved. Agree the terms of the deal. Make it specific.

There was a roaring fire. She sat on a pile of furs at the foot of his dark, thronelike chair; Persephone at the other end of a heavy oak dining table. It was long enough that if the King and Queen stretched out their arms to each other their fingertips would only just touch.

Persephone acted as though she were not there; Hades fed her titbits. When she tried to take a piece of meat with her hand, he slapped it away, and put it directly into her mouth. It tasted warm and rich and satisfying.

Afterwards, she didn't go back to her cage, but stayed on the furs by the fire.

One dinnertime, after many, Persephone was not there. Instead of leaving straight after they had eaten, he sat down in his leather armchair, and beckoned her to sit at his feet. He stroked her hair.

'Do you desire me?' he said.

There was no point in telling the truth. 'No.'

'Will you come to my bed tonight?'

'You don't need to ask me,' she said. 'I am in your power. If you take me to your bed, there is nothing I can do to resist.'

'I do not choose to take you against your will.'

She stared into the flames, feeling the warmth on her face, listening to their faint crackle. 'If I come to your bed, what will you give me in return?' she asked.

'What do you _think_ I will give you?'

He fucked her hard, each thrust sending a jolt of pain and pleasure through her body. Pain and pleasure had been to her like memories of infancy, hazy and unreal, artefacts from impossibly long ago. Afterwards, she let her hands explore her own body, finding to her wonder that the capacity for pain and pleasure had not ceased with his touch.

He watched her, smiling, as she brought herself to the brink and lingered there for a few sweet moments before giving way.

'My wife returns tomorrow,' he said. He held her close to his side. The sheets were crisp and clean and white. She would miss those sheets.

She wondered what 'tomorrow' meant. What he referred to as a 'day' could sometimes feel like weeks, sometimes minutes.

'I'm glad for you.' She had shared his bed for a long time. It would be strange for that to finish, though she supposed the time would come round again.

'Are you?' He gave a low chuckle. 'But where will you dwell, if not in my bed?'

'Wherever you will it.' Inside the cage. In front of the fire. Somewhere new. It was all the same.

'But if I gave you the choice?'

She didn't answer.

'If I gave you the free choice. Where would you go? Back to your lover?' He said the last word with a sneer. That riled her.

'It depends,' she said. 'What would you give me if I chose to stay?'

'What would you ask?'

He smelled of iron and sweat and ashes. She no longer had any other home, any other lover. 'Information,' she said.

'Information,' he repeated. It was not a question, but he seemed to be waiting for her to go on.

'Like, when you say you're doing a deal, who are you dealing with?' Who had the power to _deal_ with him, and not just take the choices that were no choice at all?

'My family, mostly. My family is large and somewhat ... interesting.' She felt the _basso profundo_ of the last word deep in her belly.

'Tell me more,' she said.

'You are asking for my secrets,' he said. 'Do you understand what must inevitably happen to those who know my secrets?'

She was not afraid. 'I can guess,' she said.

'Oh?'

'I guess it's not very pleasant.'

At first she didn't understand where the rumbling was coming from, but then she realised it was his laugh. 'That's a matter of opinion,' he said. 'Someone who knows my secrets is by definition my secretary.'

He was trying to make a joke, she realised, and wondered whether she ought to laugh too.

Her suit was tailored to fit her perfectly, in black with yellow pinstripes.

'Why yellow?' she asked.

'Where you are now is not so different from where you started, little songbird,' he said. 'Down here, a secretary must be many things, but most of all, she must be a canary. When there's poison in the air – when there's dissent or rebellion – she must be the first to know of it.'

And be the first to die, she thought. That's what happened to canaries in coalmines, wasn't it? She didn't say anything, but only smiled.

She had missed using her intellect. More than missed it: it was another hunger, as bad as the hunger for food or for connection. She would use her intellect to understand his work, of course, to help him make better deals, to keep things in order. But she would also use it for her own benefit. Down here, information was gold, and she was to be a rich woman.

No, she was not a canary. Perhaps – if she chose – Euridice would _be_ the poison in the air.


End file.
